Please support democracy

Without your support, Democracy Watch can't win key changes to stop governments and big businesses from abusing their power and hurting you and your family. Please click here to support democracy now

Honesty in Politics Campaign

Advocating for a strict, easily accessible and effective system to penalize election candidates, politicians, government and political party officials who mislead the public (including by switching parties between elections)

Please send your letter now using the form on this page, and please help spread the word by Liking and Tweeting this page.

honest – 1. fair and just in character or behaviour, not cheating or stealing 2. free of deceit and untruthfulness, sincere 3. fairly earned (an honest living)

The Opportunity

The pressure is increasing on the federal government and provincial governments (especially Ontario) to pass an honesty-in-politics law.

The federal Conservatives broke many of their 2006 federal election promises, including in the area of strengthening government accountability, and the Ontario Liberals also broke many of the election promises they made in the 2004 provincial election.

Incredibly, the federal Conservatives removed (through Bill C-2, the so-called “Federal Accountability Act”) the one rule in federal ethics rules that requires Cabinet ministers, their staff, and senior government officials to “act with honesty.” To see details, click here.

The federal New Democratic Party (NDP) pledged in the 2006 federal election to push for the creation of a Parliamentary Commissioner who would take complaints and audit the federal government in terms of promises made and promises kept or broken. Unfortunately, the NDP’s proposal would not cover all federal politicians and government officials, just politicians in the ruling party.

So while the pressure is increasing for an “honesty-in-politics” law, politicians need to hear from you before they will act.

Every government in Canada needs to pass an “honesty in politics” law that bans lying, gives voters an easy way to complain to an independent watchdog agency, and gives the watchdog agency full powers to investigate, rule and penalize the political “misleader” with a high fine (equal to at least 2 years’ salary).

To see more details, go to Democracy Watch’s December 2011 op-ed on the need for an honesty-in-politics law.

Background

Election candidates, politicians, their staff, appointees and government officials across Canada have lied to the public many times, far too many times, in the past.

Whether making “bait-and-switch” promises during elections, or trying to cover-up wrongdoing or to push their agenda through misleading statements, these lies undermine good government in every way.

How are voters supposed to vote when they don’t know what they will get after the election because all the candidates are lying? How are voters supposed to hold governments accountable if it is legal for politicians and government officials to lie?

Dishonesty in politics is the #1 reason why Canadians don’t vote according to polls conducted by Elections Canada.

Incredibly, during federal election campaigns, and during elections in every province and territory except Quebec and New Brunswick, it is illegal for anyone to lie about a candidate, but it is only illegal in B.C. for a candidate to lie about what they promise to do or what they have done.

The B.C. law is a good first step, but it requires voters to file a costly court application if they believe that a candidate has lied during an election, and there is no effective penalty even if the candidate did lie.

In complete contrast, if any Canadian corporation lies in its advertising, only 6 Canadians need to sign and send a letter to the Competition Bureau and the Bureau must investigate and determine whether the corporation lied, and what corrective measures are required, and the Bureau has the power to penalize a corporation that lies in its ads. For example, the Competition Bureau ruled that Sears Canada was guilty of lying in its advertising in 2005, and Sears was fined millions of dollars.

And if any corporation or corporate executive lies to their shareholders, the shareholders have the right to go to court and seek compensation for the damage done by the lies. Thousands of shareholders have received compensation for losses caused by the lies of corporate executives in the past decade in North America.

Similarly, politicians have passed laws requiring taxpayers, immigrants, welfare applicants, witnesses in court cases, lawyers and other professionals to all tell the truth, with strong penalties for those who lie.

Why? Because politicians have recognized that if these people and companies are allowed to lie, society will be undermined as many other people are abused and hurt by the lies.

However, politicians continue to protect themselves and others involved in politics by refusing to pass a law requiring them all to tell the truth.

Every poll taken in the past decade in Canada shows that voters are sick of the ongoing lying by election candidates, politicians and government officials, and that they want it stopped.

24193 messages sent!

Send your letter to key politicians calling for the passage of an "Honesty-in-Politics" law to ensure election candidates, politicians, and government officials who mislead the public are penalized(See list of politicians below)

I am writing to urge you and your political party to work with other parties to pass an honesty-in-politics law that includes the following key measures (or add rules to the ethics laws (such as the federal Conflict of Interest Act) and/or ethics codes to include the following measures):

any statement made by any nomination race candidate, election candidate, politician, staff, Cabinet appointee or government official at any time must be covered by the law;

all Canadians must be allowed to file a complaint about dishonesty;

complaints about false or fraudulent advertising or statements during elections should be reviewed by the elections watchdog agency (such as Elections Canada), who must have the power to penalize violators (as in B.C., and similar to the existing right to complain about false advertising or fraud by businesses that is enforced by the federal Competition Bureau);

complaints about false or fraudulent advertising or statements in between elections should be reviewed by the ethics/integrity commissioner (such as the federal Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner);

the ethics commissioner must only be able to excuse a broken election promise if there is an emergency situation or a complete change of situation since the election that forced the government to break the promise;

the ethics commissioner must have full investigative powers and be required to fine political “misleaders”;

the fine must be equal to at least 2 years’ salary of the candidate, politician, or government official, and loss of any severance payment, and a partial clawback of their pension payments, and if the candidate or politician is in a leadership position in a political party (e.g. party leader, Cabinet minister, opposition critic), their party should also be required to pay a similar amount as a fine;

and the law must also contain a specific section covering party-switching by politicians, including the following key measures that will give politicians a clear (and important) right to defy their party leader and caucus, but only for justifiable reasons, not just because they have career ambitions:

politicians should only be allowed to switch between elections if they can prove clearly that their party has broken election promises, or switched directions on significant policies, or if their party leader does not resign after being found guilty of ethical or other legal violations;

in all other cases, the politician would have to resign and run in a by-election or (if a general election is called before the by-election is held) in that general election;

politicians expelled from a party’s caucus would not have to resign because expulsion is not the politician’s decision — however, to respect voter rights any politician expelled should be required to consult with voters in his or her riding about whether they should sit as an independent or join another party;

to ensure that justifiable reasons for a politician’s switching decision are not abused as a convenient excuse (as they often have been in the past), the ethics commissioner be given the power to decide whether the switching is valid, and;

if the reason a politician has been expelled from caucus is that politician has been found guilty of unethical or illegal behaviour, then the ethics commissioner should be given the power to penalize the politician with suspension or removal from Parliament (in the same way the courts can for election fraud).

Please let me know what you will do to ensure that these changes are made as soon as possible. I will be deciding which political party to vote for in the next election based on the responses I receive from representatives in each party. I look forward to hearing from you.

Thank you for sending your letter, and please help keep this campaign going until these key democracy reforms are won. To donate now, please click here.

NOTE: Democracy Watch will protect your privacy, and keep you informed about this campaign and others.